donation to the school. On December 11, 2014, the beam-signing ceremony of the new Worthing campus occurred. The several design changes and controversies about the construction had delayed the establishment of the wing. It is a part of the 2007 bond program, and as of January 2015 it was one of the few projects from that bond still not completed. Stafford, Texas-based Fort Bend Mechanical was supposed to build the Worthing wing but it got into a legal dispute with HISD. Gil Ramirez, another contractor, accused the owner of Fort Bend Mechanical, David "Pete" Medford, of giving Super Bowl tickets and $25,000 to HISD trustee Larry Marshall in order to get a construction contract with HISD; Ramirez sued HISD and trustee Larry Walker. In addition, the City of Houston Department of Public Works and Engineering approved one set of building plans, but the architectural firm, Molina Walker, then used a different set of plans never approved by the city government to the contractors building the school. Carpenter stated that the delay in the renovation and the infighting reduced trust in HISD within the local community. The new building opened in 2016, around ten years after the intended opening. As part of the 2014-2015 rezoning, residents of South Park located west of Martin Luther King Boulevard were rezoned from Jones High School to Worthing. John Modest, the principal, stated that he expected to receive 200 new students. In 2017 HISD officials installed Khalilah Campbell-Rhone, former Thomas Middle School principal, as the principal of Worthing, after the state government threatened to take control of HISD from its school board. The administration chose her because of the school's academic record during her tenure. The board spent increased student support services, added instructional coaches, and gave incentives to teachers, all totalling $1 million. It also removed 60% of the existing teachers and replaced them with new ones. In a five-year period ending circa 2018 Worthing received $8,100 in funding per student, an amount higher than many other area high schools partially due to the amount of federal funding. Student body In the 1990s the school had around 2,000 students. In 2000 Worthing had over 1,700 students. In the 2013–2014 school year Worthing had 640 students, in 2014-2015 it had 685 students, and as of 2016 it had about 680 students. 86% were African-American, 13% were Hispanic, and the remainder were of other ethnic groups.